1. Field of the Invention
The present invention relates generally to artificial Christmas trees and, in particular, to a decorative light-supporting apparatus for holding connected strings of lights.
2. Description of Related Art
Artificial Christmas trees are often expensive and cumbersome to assemble and store. Many artificial Christmas trees sold with lights preaffixed can be especially expensive. Some trees include metal parts which can be heavy, as well as dangerous in the event of an electrical short.
Artificial Christmas trees often include a trunk and numerous branches that are expensive, complex, and time-consuming to assemble and store. The numerous branches must be sufficiently strong, and are angled upwards to prevent excessive sagging of the branches from the weight of the lights. Additionally, the trunks are often made of several trunk pieces. The number of the trunk pieces may be changed to vary the height of the tree. If the trunk pieces are not firmly fastened together, a user lifting the tree from a top portion of the trunk can sever the trunk. Thus, the lights burden the branches with a downward force and do not hold the tree together when lifted.
The prior art has proposed light-supporting frames, which resemble shapes of a lighted tree at night, but these designs are often complex. For example, U.S. Pat. No. 5,094,893 to Snider discloses a light-supporting frame which draws support from a large number of guy wires. The metal guy wires present an electrical hazard, and add to the assembly time for the tree. Ends of guy wires can puncture fingers, and the wires and stakes are cumbersome to disassemble and store.